A New Fathers Guide to Diapers

There are a good number of books out there on this crap(drum roll), but most people just Google this stuff, and it brings them to a website that has the information. So here we are providing you the information based on my own personal experience in the diaper lab here at the institute. This is the man’s guide to changing diapers or a practical guide or real-world guide cause they never tell you the nitty- gritty in those self help books.

And just for your own edification – diapers all use the same chemical to absorb wetness. Acrylic acid is a key component of super-absorbent polymers or SAP, which absorb large amounts of liquid. And a plant in Japan named Nippon Shokubai makes roughly 20 percent of the world’s SAP and maintains a 10 percent global market share of acrylic acid. Which is why in 2012 when the plant had an explosion – there was a slight shortage of disposable diapers. But really, we didn’t notice, when you buy diapers you usually by larger quantities to save money. I tell you this so you get some science up in here and feel more manly about changing a diaper when you know how its made.

We’ll cover several topics under this genre of diapers:

1. Choice of Diapers Brand and Quality
2. Changing the Diaper
3. Difference between boys and girls (really is there one? [note the sarcasm here])
4. When to tell your wife its her turn

1. Your choice in diaper early on will be the best or worst decision you will ever make.

Seriously, I had no idea there were so many brands and stupid options when it comes to diapers. When you’re at the hospital you’ll most likely be given something because diaper manufactures will provide the hospital some free diapers to try to get you hooked on their brand since psychologically its a great hook “well we used it in the hospital, they must use it for a reason”. This is not always the case. But its a good marketing ploy.

Also – if your wife or significant other is saying something like “oh we should do the all natural route and do cloth diapers.” You poor bastard. Plus, I don’t think that will last – the realization of what you’re doing and how much work it is will sink in and hopefully you’ll get back on the “Whoever came up with disposable diapers is f’n amazing train soon enough.”

Now, on to actual brand choice.

I’ve discovered through thorough testing that one brand seems to stand out early on. Now I’ve heard my wife say things like “well every baby is different and diapers fit different babies different,” but I say hogwash. Cause as a first time dad, the first thing you have to learn is “when the hell did my baby soil his/her diaper?” Pampers Swaddlers tell you. Seriously, they have a freaking blue line in them so when your kid takes a leak or drops a deuce (and early on its really not much solid anyway) you’ll tell right away cause the freaking blue line.

It changes yellow to blue when it gets wet

I’m sure some of the other vendors will do this, but right now Pampers is the only one I’ve found that does it and they only have them to size 2 or 3. After that I suspect they know that you’ll freaking get when the diaper is wet or not. And trust me you will.

But back to other brands. I’ve tried Costco, Walmart HEB, Pampers and Huggies. We’ve also just done the amazon prime thing and they have a diaper subscription where you get a set number of diapers per month delivered and save money. But the trend is the same – Pampers seems to do the best job of “containing” the disaster than any of the others. I’ve even had HEB and Walmart brand diapers leak on me. Seriously, I picked my kid up after he slept all night, set him on my knee and his full diaper just starts leaking on my leg. I’ve also had more “containment issues” with the Walmart and especially the HEB brands where it couldn’t contain the amount of poop, and it got all over my kids clothing among other things. Yeah you really want to hear this right? But this is the reality of it – you want a diaper that can contain the poop and not get on your kids clothes or yours.

So here is what I’ve learned – if you want to go cheap with Walmart brand or similar, go ahead, but use it for short periods of time – not for night time sleeping, if your kid is pretty regular and you know he isn’t going to have a huge crap surprise, use the cheaper kind, but when you put your kid to sleep use the good kind.

So how to know when its wet/full?

Like I said, the blue line is freaking awesome. Because, as a new parent, unless your wife or you moonlighted as a diaper changer in another life your not going to know the magic. Plus new borns don’t put out as much. Once your child has gotten a bit older – 3-4 months you’ll be in the larger swaddlers and you’ll begin to notice that when your child urinates, front of the diaper will become puffy, plus there is the blue line. When your kid gets even older, like I said, they don’t need the blue lines cause you’ll just know when the diaper is full it will be waaay more puffy. And of course you’ll smell the poop. You prob won’t smell it early on but once they eat solid foods (baby food), oh you’ll smell it. I never thought I’d randomly pick up a baby and put my nose to its ass before… well you will with your kid.

2. Changing the Diaper

If done right, this actually takes no time at all. Make sure you or your wife has actually gone out and purchased a changing table; seriously it makes a difference. I find that preparation prior to removing the toxic waste is the key – especially after your kid moves on to solid food.

Seriously, have it all there handy, you’ll really.. really.. regret it if you don’t.

So once you have your baby on the changing table, pull a couple wet-wipes out ahead of time- place them on the side. Sometimes it helps to give your baby something to play with his hands while you’re in the process – this helps so your baby doesn’t inadvertently put his hand in his own poo and then try to eat it. Here are my tips( in no specific order) to changing the diaper:

1. Open up the new diaper and put it under the baby and existing diaper (just in case). Diapers have these Velcro like attachments on each side, those go on the bottom and wrap to the front; not front to back. Its all folded up tight, so spread it all out and then put it under your baby’s butt.2.Pull out some extra wipes ahead of time, especially if you know your kid has just had a massive crap pull out like 4-5 or more. Don’t wait and try to one-hand these things out of the wet-wipe dispenser, especially when it gets close to being empty – you’ll be trying to hold your kids legs up, keep his hands away from his ass, and trying to get a wipe so you can wipe the smear of poop off whatever he just touched.3. Don’t try to save the environment by sparing the wipes. Seriously, just wipe away some of the poo with one, grab another.4. If its pee, then your job is soooo much easier. Wipe once, use baby powder if you so choose and throw new diaper on (30 seconds tops).5. If your kid has sat in crap for a while – ie, you weren’t sure he/she did anything at all. Chances all you want to apply some ointment (A&D, Destin, Beudreauxs Butt Paste) to avoid your kid getting super irritated and just screaming and crying and grabbing you and himself.6. Baby powder smells great (at least better than human feces), sprinkle that shit everywhere to mask the sent of poo.7. Sometimes changing your babies diaper in the car is better than a public restroom… but.. make sure to have a mat to change your baby on, a plastic bag, or a tarp.. whatever. You don’t want poop smeared on the inside of your car right?

3. The difference between boys and girls in terms of diapers.

Boys have a tendency to take a leak as soon as your remove the diaper – the blast of fresh air I guess is what causes it. The trick I’ve found is to keep the diaper ready to drop right back down. it doesn’t work every time but 75% of the time I catch it. And they don’t pee every time just every once in a while.

Girls of course you have to worry about getting poo in the genital area. Wipe from front to back. If it does get in there – front to back as well, get it all out. While girls can pee when you remove the diaper as well – you have less of a chance of that pee hitting you in the face.

4. When to tell your wife its her turn.

If I could go back in time and tell my wife that I’d change all the newborn diapers while my son was breast feeding I would. Those are the best kind of diapers. The poo is seedy, yellowish, not really poo, looked more like bird food that wasn’t digested, and it didn’t really smell. Take my advice, offer to do more early, and enjoy it while it lasts.

When that kid starts eating solid food, holy crap. You finally feel like you’re cleaning up real poo. I mean, real, nasty, stinky poo. And when your kid smears it all over the wall, you, his clothes, your clothes and you’ve just thrown up all over you and your kid. You’ll know its time to call in your wife.

But seriously.. have a girl and she gets poo in the vag, call the wife. Have a major disaster: call the wife. Many times its really a two-man (person) job to do clean-up.

In Summary

Lastly I’ll leave you with this – types of poo to expect from howtobeadad.com – I came across his site while looking for diaper diagrams, I have to say pretty funny stuff.